Four days filled with four thousand flitting, flaming memories...
Attempting chronological depiction:
This year
Was the first time that I didn't celebrate hallowe'en.
Part of me is revelling in the fact that last time I lived in France, when Hallowe'en was still an american rumour, we raced around Grenoble in white gowns with painted faces and kissed every stranger we came across.
Part of me is revelling that now that sheer commercialism has brought orange candy and terrible plastic costumes into this place, part of me is thrilled to have missed out on goth night and spent the evening with a cup of tea and clever conversation.
(By the time the smoke stopped pouring from the bar where the Navette usually drops us off at the metro, and by the time I'd marched that fateful trajet again, my vision was dancing in colours that not even hallowe'en could have been responsible for.)
Terrified that I'd disappointed the poor Mr. Pyke with my inability to play proper hostess and drag him to see a goth bar, and disappointed just a little myself to not have the strength crawl into my shimmering corset,
we nevertheless spent a delightful evening of science fiction and childhood traumas and tales of magic and mayhem...
...and I for one, preferred it to anything over-kohled and over-rated.
And I remembered to kiss my dead, didn't survive the vigil in my fever but I kissed her nonetheless.
And found out how torontonians pronounce Samhein.
And the weekend only became dizzier from there.
Tales will ensue.